502 The Dog Book 



with any animal, bull, bear, wolf, or badger, and displaying extraor- 

 dinary dexterity in the destruction of vermin, qualities which they still 

 retain in the utmost perfection.'* 



Colonel Hamilton Smith gives no further details of the terriers, but 

 gives four illustrations, one of an Isle of Skye terrier and three terriers 

 he specifies as Scottish, of which the latter do not concern us at present. 

 At that time the Skye terrier was thoroughly well known throughout the 

 United Kingdom, Queen Victoria having specimens of the breed, an ex- 

 ample which was followed by many of her faithful "people." 



To account for the length of coat on the Skye terrier we have the 

 usual statement as to introduced crosses, some alleging that poodles from 

 wrecked ships of the Spanish Armada were crossed on the native dogs 

 and thus produced the longer coats. It must not be supposed that the 

 length of coat mentioned by Stonehenge and those who wrote at that period 

 was anything like what we are now accustomed to see, and a little common 

 sense in appreciating what modern fanciers have accomplished within 

 thirty years will also enable the reader to understand that the many years 

 of the breed's existence before it became known would permit of the added 

 length of coat by a very limited amount of selection and following of fancy 

 in developing a dog with a moderate length of coat from such a dog as we 

 now have in the Scottish terrier. One has only to go back some twenty 

 years to find in the English kennel papers letters of protest against the length 

 of coat of show specimens of that date as being altogether wrong in the 

 Skye terrier, yet they would be considered out of coat nowadays. 



What is really of more importance than coat in the way of change is 

 the ear carriage. Twenty-five years ago the drop-eared Skye was the correct 

 thing, and a Mr. Pratt of Paddington had a splendid kennel of this variety. 

 The erect-eared dogs were then unfashionable, and Stonehenge repudiated 

 them, but the tide turned and so far as this country is concerned we cannot 

 recall when we saw a drop-eared Skye. They still have them in England, 

 but they are now in as much of a minority as the pricked-eared ones were in 

 Mr. Pratt's time, thirty years ago. 



The term Skye, as applied by the American public not conversant 

 with details of breeds, covers a larger field than any other name in the 

 dog world, and although this Is not so much the case as it was a few years 

 ago, yet it is necessary to say that the small long-coated terriers are not 

 Skyes, but are mainly of Yorkshire extraction. The Skye is a dog weighing 



